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Poor women to get mobile feeds on their financial info
Poor women in Andhra Pradesh could soon get access to their financial transactions on mobile.About 90 lakh women members of self help Groups (SHGs) in Andhra Pradesh can look forward to this facility, thanks to a mobile book-keeping project being launched by the State Government.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- South Asia
- Tags
- microfinance
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Weekly Roundup: Flushed – Is This Any Way to Crowdsource a Social Enterprise?
On Tuesday, founder and CEO of Good Goods, took a seat on the throne and didn’t get off until 50 hours later - all while under the watchful eye of a webcam. By then Simmon Griffiths and company had raised more than $50,000 in pre-orders to fund the first bulk production run of Good Goods’ new line of toilet paper: ‘Who Gives A Crap’. Working with WaterAid, the company plans to dedicate 50 percent of the paper’s profits to build toilets and improve sanitation in developing countries.
- Categories
- Health Care, Social Enterprise, Technology
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How ‘farmerbook’ Brings Transparency and Networking to the BoP
The new ‘farmerbook’, an initiative from Digital Green aims to bring transparency and networking to rural India, by allowing users to see how best practices in farming promoted by Digital Green are shared and adapted.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Technology
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Are mobile phones better than aid?
Helping people to use technology can combat poverty more effectively than centralised aid programmes according to a leading development entrepreneur.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- South Asia
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What the SOCCKET is (And What it is Not)
It looks like the prototype do-gooder-gimmick – a football (soccer ball) that produces and stores electricity, which can power a solar lantern at night. Each ball financed by Western backers, they are donated in developing countries. I had the chance to kick it at the Rio Summit – it’s a fun concept, but does it hold up to its promise?
- Categories
- Energy, Technology
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One billion smartphones by 2014. Bottom-of-the-pyramid market never looked better
It’s been a while since bottom of the pyramid — famously enunciated by the late management guru C.K. Prahlad — has been perceived to be an attractive market.
- Categories
- Technology
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Mobile Money: How Cell Phones Can Fight Hunger in the Sahel
Some five billion people worldwide were using mobile phones in 2010, according to the International Telecommunication Union, with the strongest growth taking place in developing countries. Africa is the fastest growing mobile market. In the past six years, the industry estimates that the number of subscribers has grown nearly 20 percent each year. At this rate, we can expect to see some 735 million cell phone users in Africa by the end of 2012.
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- nutrition
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A Formula for Social Innovation?: Reflections from the UN Social Innovation Summit, 2012.
At last week’s United Nations Social Innovation Summit in New York, all manner of change agents - from social entrepreneurs, to philanthropists, industry titans, impact investors and celebrities stretched the confines of a term that, admittedly, gets thrown around haphazardly and can mean different things to different people. What exactly is “social innovation?”
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Technology